Monday, March 31, 2014

Well, I love Avatar so I suppose I still enjoyed this book,
but it wasn’t as cool as I thought it would be.First it is set up as a juvenile book where the author has secretly
gathered information you can’t share with anyone!It was a little over the top for me.The majority of the book was just a recap
from Sokka’s, Katara’s and Aang’s POV of certain episodes of the show.I didn’t feel like I got any more value out
of it.

The only thing of value I found was the background
information on the Fire Nation.Although
I already knew most of it, there were a few things I learned from it.One was that the Fire Lord was originally the
head Fire Sage until he broke off wanting to control the nation.Also, it shows you the different martial arts
styles that firebending is based off of.Not knowing much about martial arts, this was interesting to me.

Other than that though, this really didn’t add anything to
my Avatar universe.If you’re an Avatar
fan and you find this book really cheap somewhere (like I did), I say go ahead
and pick it up and add it to your collection.If you have to pay full price, I say that this book is not worth it.

Wednesday, March 26, 2014

I enjoyed this addition to the Selection series.It was nice to get some background info on
both the boys.It also had quite abit of extra content at the end of the book
as well.

The Prince:

I had already read this book in its ebookformat.But I skimmed through it again as a refresher.I like seeing the world through Maxon’s
eyes.I really liked that it actually started
before the Selection and we could see his anxiety about it, his
preparations.It was very
interesting.We got to see more of his
relationship with his mother and father as well.The King is cruel, but the Queen loves her
son and tries to look out for him.The
best part was seeing scenes from Maxon’s POV that we saw in The Selection.Specifically the scene where she knees him
because she thought he was going to try to seduce her.Haha!His reaction was priceless.It’s
such a sweet touch to the story we already enjoy.

The Guard:

It’s no secret that I am on Team Maxon.With that said, I wasn’t sure how I was going
to like The Guard, since it is from Aspen’s POV.But I actually ended up really liking
it.This story actually starts in the Elite,
when Aspen becomes a guard.We watch as
he has to deal with being around America and watching her spend time with
another man.Even though I’m rooting for
Maxon, it was still hard to imagine being in love with someone and watching
them swoon over someone else.The
insider info on the rebel attacks was very interesting.We were able to see things happening at the
palace that we didn’t know before.It
made me like Aspen more, but it didn’t take my desire for America to end up
with Maxon away.

The One (sneak peek):

I loved that we got to see the first 3 chapters of The
One!!It was hilarious.America’s actions trying to win Maxon’s
affections back made me laugh so hard!There was a little bit of recap mentioned in it, which I appreciated
because I didn’t quite remember everything that had happened.But I love that Maxon seems to really care
about America.This sneak peek has me
very excited for the book to come out.I
hope she doesn’t ruin the series like Veronica Roth did with the Divergent
series!

Extras:

There are quite a few extras we also get with this book.

There is a short Q&A with Kiera Cass.I skimmed over these looking for questions or answers I actually cared about.I always enjoy hearing how stories comes together for authors though.I think I especially appreciate them now that my husband is an aspiring author.And every story is different!

There’s a list of the Selected girls, where they are from, and their caste number.

There’s a list of jobs that would be related to each caste, just to help us classify ourselves if we lived in that world.

America’s Family tree – there is a history added also which is very interesting to read.

Aspen’s Family tree – also a history is included, but it wasn’t as interesting to me.

Maxon’s Family tree – very interesting history added here.I especially enjoyed this piece of extra that we received.Gave me more insight in to King Clarkson and Queen Amberly.

The Selection official playlist

The Elite official playlist

If you have read and enjoy the Selection Series, you should
definitely pick up this book before The One is released.It’s a good read as a refresher and to give
you a little extra insight in to many of the characters.

I enjoyed this story enough. The concept of the story was
pretty good.I really liked the Syrena
(merpeople) and the story between the two mer-kingdoms.But there were some frustrating and annoying
aspects of the story as well where the author didn’t execute, which is why I’ve
only given this 3 stars.

Things I liked: I liked Galen and Rayna.They were interesting characters to get to
know and I liked seeing their lives on land and in the water.We also got to know their history in the Triton
kingdom.Sure Galen was the typical YA
male love interest (super sexy, everyone wants him), but I’m okay with
that.As long as he wasn’t annoying.

I thought the overall story was good, if you ignored the
annoying things that I list below.The
whole half-human half-mermaid thing was interesting.The history between Poseidon and Triton was
pretty interesting. The gifts that show up in royal bloodlines were really
interesting – even though we aren’t sure what the Triton gift is anymore.The overall concept of this story was pretty
good – the author just failed to execute in areas and put some of things you
shouldn’t ever have in your novel in other areas which is what hurts the rating
for me.

Also, I read this as an audio book.So far, this has been the best reader.She had a lot of different voices which
helped me keep track of who was actually talking.Though she still didn’t pull off a great man’s
voice, at least she was able to differentiate them all enough that you know who
was who.I applaud the reader for that
and it helped me keep track of the story better.

First, I hated the overuse of “Oh my sweet goodness!” –
something minor and small, I know.The
first time it was kind of funny.But the
sixth and seventh time I was annoyed.No
one talks like that and it just jarred me from the dialogue that was going
on.If the author had just left it at “Oh
my gosh” or “Oh my God”, the dialogue in those scenes would have flowed so much
better.

Second, the whole stalker thing was kind of just thrown in
there.At the end it kind of all made
sense, but it annoyed me that they didn’t “sense” the stalker right away.So it just seemed like it came out of
nowhere.And it didn’t even play a part
until right at the very end.If the
author was going to do this (which would have been fine in my book), she should
have had it come up a lot earlier in the story.

I also didn’t like how Emma’s mother pushed her to admit
that she and Galen were dating even though they weren’t.It was a really stupid part of the book
because it didn’t even become part of the story!It felt so forced and I hated it, and then I
really hated it when it didn’t even matter.I’m not sure why the author chose to do that.

Emma got pretty annoying by the middle of the book as well.
I’m not sure why female main characters end up being annoying in the books
anymore.It’s so frustrating.How hard is it to write a likeable
character?Her obstinance was so
frustrating.If you’re learning about a
new world, you should probably listen to the people who are from that world and
are teaching you.UGH.

The cliffhanger. Okay.There is a HUGE difference between wrapping up your story and leaving
with a cliffhanger and then just cutting your story off right in the
middle.This story was cut off right in
the middle.The author didn’t know how
to leave a cliffhanger but still leave the reader feeling like they have some
sort of closure to the book.This one
just cut off.I found myself with only
10 minutes left in the book wondering how so much was going to happen…and I was
right.It didn’t!She just ends it!Seriously?Of course now that I’ve invested so much time in to the story, I need to
read the second one, but I can tell you right now that I won’t be buying it
myself after that ending. Basically this
author is writing one giant story and chopping it in thirds, as opposed to
writing 3 books with an arc that covers all three books.

Friday, March 21, 2014

March 21, 2014.Today
is a day that I should be celebrating.Instead, I’m grieving.Our baby
boy’s due date was today.Instead of
holding him, kissing him, and introducing him to our family, we can only light
a candle and remember what could have been.

It is such a terrible feeling to have to grieve for your
baby.And though after experiencing it,
I’ve found that many other people I know have gone through it, I still feel
like I’m alone.I’ve been blogging about
it ever since it happened, and I’ve had several people tell me that my blog has
helped them with their own experiences, or to understand how someone who has
had a miscarriage is feeling.Honestly,
that was the main reason I wanted to blog about it.Talking to other people who know what it
feels like really helped me deal with the situation.Helped me understand that what I was feeling
was normal.But today I still feel
alone.It’s been 6 months since our
miscarriage, and most other people have forgotten about it.Only a few select people still ask me how I’m
doing.The world has forgotten about our
lost baby, but we haven’t.And we never
will.

In reviewing how I felt at the time, I still have some of
the same feelings.My hopes and dreams
for my baby boy still haunt me.I want
to know what he would have been like.I
want to have had an impact on his life.I still want us to be mommy and daddy.I’m still angry that our baby was taken from us when so many other women
CHOOSE to end their pregnancies or women who don’t want kids have healthy
pregnancies.I am still irritated when I
hear women complaining about their pregnancies.Bringing a life in to the world is a gift – so stop complaining about
it.

But I’ve also grown in these 6 months.I’ve learned that I can’t freeze time.That there is a reason that God took our baby
from us, and though I don’t understand it, He has a good reason.I know that I’m not to blame for what
happened.There was nothing I did wrong
or could have done differently to save our baby.I know that I will never forget my baby.He will always be on my mind and in my heart
and no one can ever take that away from me.And just because I move on with my life, doesn’t mean that I’m
forgetting him.I’ve also learned that I
was able to help a lot of other people with having made our announcement before
losing our baby.Though I didn’t know
how many other friends have been through the same thing, I have been able to
help other people, and those same people have helped me.I think God knew that I would need that.

The experience has also brought to our attention what a
loving support system of friends and family we have.Many of them were just as excited as we were,
and were just as devastated as we were - even if they’ve never experienced a
miscarriage in their own lives.It has
made our marriage stronger.It brought
us closer together and really helped us to open up to each other more.Under all those raw emotions, there was no
way to conceal anything.

So today I will cry.I will ask God why he took our baby.I will send love up to my baby.I
will light a candle in remembrance.It
will be a hard day for me.For us.But I also know that our baby would want us
to focus on the new baby.To not want us
to love this baby any less.And though I
feel like the world has forgotten our baby, especially now that we’ve announced
we’re expecting again, we never will.And our baby boy knows that, and keeps watch on us from Heaven.

Remember, cherish every day, every breath you are given,
because tomorrow is never promised.

“Take our million
teardrops, wrap them up in love, then ask the wind to carry them, to you in
Heaven above.” – sayinggoodbye.org

“As
a butterfly graces our lives with one moment’s fragile beauty, so too has your
baby’s presence blessed you, and those that surround you with their short life,
and unique spirit. May you find peace, and joy with each butterfly that passes,
knowing that your baby lives on in the hearts of all they touched.”

Thursday, March 20, 2014

As you can see from the picture above, we are pregnant
again!Today is officially a day farther
along than we were last time (13w6d).Since everything seems to be going much better this time, we decided
that it is time to announce our news.

This week has been especially stressful for two reasons: 1)
this is the week in which we miscarried last time, so every twinge has had me
freaking out, and 2) this Friday (March 21) was our original due date.It has been super tough to deal with all these
emotions this week.I think that is
probably part of the reason that I haven’t been sleeping well.There seems to be a lot of coincidences this
time.Not only did these two dates
coincide, but we had miscarried on Sept 18, 2013, and this baby is due on Sept
19, 2014.Talk about a rollercoaster of
emotions then too!

This time around though, I have been experiencing many more
pregnancy symptoms than last time.From
extreme fatigue, to nausea when I was hungry, to severe back pain, it makes me
feel a lot safer.We also had a strong
heartbeat at 175 bpm at 8 weeks.We also
elected to do the nuchal screening at 12 weeks (which was recommended by our
doctor due to our past experience) and baby still had a strong heartbeat at 161
bpm.The results came back with no
detection of any chromosomal abnormalities, and we also got to see our sweet
baby still growing on target!Phew.I have a few great ultrasound pictures from
this that I will upload later today to this post.

Though we still have worry in the back of our mind, we both
feel much better about this pregnancy – almost a sense of calm – at least as
calm as you can be after experiencing a miscarriage.Last time I had had a dream around 8 weeks
that we had miscarried.It actually
would be classified as a nightmare…and then it came true.This time though, I’ve had no such
dreams.And Brandon says he doesn’t have
a sick feeling in his gut that something would go wrong like he did last
time.We are also praying very hard and
we know many of our friends and family are also praying for us, and we can’t
thank you enough.

Overall this pregnancy seems to be flying by compared to the
last.I think we’re grateful to be
pregnant again and we’ve had so much going on with cleaning up the house and
putting it on the market, that time just seems to be flying by.It seems like just yesterday I was heading to
my sister-in-laws baby shower, knowing I was going to be taking a pregnancy
test that night.I can’t believe it’s
been over 2 months since then!

Now we wait for the gender ultrasound.We will see our doctor again at 16 weeks
(instead of 18 weeks) to be sure everything is going well.We’ll get to hear the heartbeat again.And then we’ll be scheduling our gender
ultrasound!We cannot wait.We want to be able to call Baby “him” or “her”.We feel so silly using “Baby” like a pronoun!
But saying “it” just sounds awful!

Until then, we have a lot planned to keep us busy instead of
focusing on the wait.We get to see some
friends this weekend, we just accepted an offer on our house, so we will be
focusing on getting that through and packing up over the next 30 days, we have
a weekend trip to San Diego planned, and then we have a wedding and the Tough
Mudder the same day!Then we’ll get to
hear the heartbeat on the Doppler.And
then we’ll finally have the day we’re waiting for!What a busy month!

Thank you to everyone who has prayed for us.We will need strength tomorrow, because as
excited as we are for this new baby, we still miss our baby boy very
dearly.We will be lighting a candle for
him so he knows we still think about him.But our future babies have something special that not all children have:
a sibling in Heaven watching out for them.And that is something special that I am clinging to. And I try to remind
myself every day to not take any day or any of the people in my life for
granted, because tomorrow is never promised.

Wednesday, March 19, 2014

We put our house up for sale on Friday, March 7, 2014.On Tuesday, March 18, 2014 we accepted an
almost full price offer.11 days.That’s pretty fast in the real estate market,
especially when it has been swinging back toward a buyer’s market.So why am I not as excited as I should
be?Because I’m giving my only home to
someone else.The home that we
built.The home that we came home from
the wedding to.The home that we brought
our puppies home to.The home where we
had and lost our baby boy.This home has
all our memories.

We were able to get an offer for only $2000 below our asking
price within 11 days.I’m very excited,
and to be honest, I expected it. Our house looks amazing.Once we cleaned it all up and got a lot of
the clutter out, I loved walking through our house.Our backyard is beautiful.It’s on a prime lot in the neighborhood.It’s a great location to Westgate (football
and hockey) and across the street from Spring Training.When I try to sell it this way, I ask myself
why we are selling it?Then I remember
it’s because we don’t quite have enough space to grow a family in it.And right now, housing prices are still low,
but our house had gained value.So it
seemed like the optimal time for us to move so we can get more house and land
in a location closer to family, and also still make money on our house.Interest rates are still low as well.But I do love our house.

After being very excited about the strong offer, and knowing
how much this young couple liked it also, we accepted the offer and now just
wait for the inspection and appraisal.We shouldn’t really see any issues here since the house is only 4.5
years old.But now I’m getting very
sentimental.We have so many memories
there and it was such a good house to us.I wish we could move a wall for a little more space and pick it up and
place it closer to family.But I can’t.I know people move all the time, and I know I
probably have more attachment than most people do…but it’s really hard for me
to think about leaving our home and having someone else living there.

So last time I started putting together a Shutterfly book to
record all the memories we had in our first home.I want to remember what it looked like, but
also everything that we accomplished while we were there.Starting with buying the house and getting
the keys, to getting married, bringing our puppies home, all our trips, the
Tough Mudder, and the loss of our baby.This way, we can always look back and see all that happened during those
4 years.

But I also know that as we start our family, we’ll create so
many new memories in a new home.And it
would have been that much harder to leave this house if we had brought our baby
home to it.We should be able to have
new memories pretty quickly at the new house.And maybe we’ll be able to get a pool so Cinder can swim all day
long.A grassy area big enough for a
swing set and the dogs to run around. A kitchen where we aren’t bumping in to
each other when we’re both cooking.Enough bedrooms to have 2 kids and an office.And close enough to our parents so that they
can babysit.It’s a tall order, but I
think we can find something that will be just as good to us now with these new
needs, as our house was with our needs 4.5 years ago.

If all goes well, we’ll be closing just after Easter.We’ll have to pack up our home and put it all
in storage the weekend before that.April 22 sounds so far away right now, but when I think about it (we
have so much going on the next few weekends!) it really doesn’t give us very
much time to pack up and say goodbye.I’m
going to miss our home so much, but I think it will take just as good of care
of the new couple as it did us.And a
new home will fit our needs now and take care of us.

Friday, March 14, 2014

This story
ended up being different than I expected.I didn’t expect such a deep story, especially in a book that was
relatively short.Tiger Lily takes place
in the world of Neverland that we all know from the Disney movie.We are given some brief history to Neverland
and the reasoning behind no one growing up – though everyone stops aging at
different times in their lives.I thought
this was most unique, and I really enjoyed how it all came back together at the
end of the story.

This story
is told from Tinkerbell’s POV.It
allowed us to see the story from multiple angles so it wasn’t all one
sided.I think that is what made this
story so interesting.Though, I did keep
wondering that if she can’t communicate, how is she telling us a story??But nevertheless, I really enjoyed that the
author chose to write the story this way.The reader is able to connect to all the characters a lot better with an
unbiased (sort of) character telling the story.

This is a
love story that may not have the happy ending you’re expecting.I never in my wildest dreams thought of a
relationship between Tiger Lily and Peter, but once it was there, it was quite
sweet.They were very different from
each other, and seemed to not quite be able to be to each other what they
needed.One thing that I didn’t like
about this story is that they were supposed to be 15 and 16, and yet, at times,
they sounded much younger.Their romance
was neat to watch unfold, and how she had to keep it a secret from her village
and the man she was betrothed to.

I didn’t
expect to see the theme of the Englander coming and trying to force new beliefs
upon the tribe.As everyone else has
said, it actually sounds a lot like when the English came to America and took
over the Native Americans, forcing their beliefs, etc on them.Tiger Lily’s tribe was fearful so they
followed him, and a terrible sacrifice was made by a character we love.I was shocked by it.

I didn’t
expect Wendy to actually show up so early in this book. But I thought it added
a great depth to the story.It creates a
jealousy in Tiger Lily – and Tink.Though I still don’t think Tinkerbell was nearly as jealous as she is
supposed to be.And it shows us that
jealousy can lead us down dark path.And
once you’re there, what do you do?How
do you come back from it?

There was a
lot of wrap up to this story, which I enjoyed.It spans 80 years after the events of the book.Apparently the author is not planning a
sequel.But that is refreshing
actually.This story is a great standalone
book, and those just don’t really exist anymore.I’m happy about where all the characters ended
up, and the letter at the end was very sweet.

Overall I
really enjoyed this book.Anyone who
enjoys the Neverland world and Peter Pan’s story should pick this up.And now I think I’m going to pick up the
original Peter Pan books.

I had heard
this series was going to be about Toph.When the book started, it didn’t seem to be about Toph at all!But don’t worry, by the end, it switches to
her, and I have a feeling most of the remainder of the series will be about
her.

All the kids
are starting to get older now.I’m happy
about this because there are still a lot of questions I want answered –
specifically what happens to Sokka? From watching Korra, we know that he ends
up on the council, but does he ever marry anyone (Suki)? Does he have
kids?How does Toph have a kid?

These
questions are not answered in this book, but the kids are growing up, so it’s
nice.Although they still act like they
did in the series.I feel that the illustrator
did a great job with all of them, except Iroh.I had no idea that was supposed to be him until someone called him by
name!

The story
was pretty good.I wasn’t sure where it
was going.It kept me guessing.I enjoy watching the world move forward from
the show and start evolving in to what we see in Korra.Does anyone else think we’ll be seeing more
of this new character that was introduced??

The
characters still seemed true to themselves…but the “Sweetie” thing is still
weird.There’s still the humor we love
and the tense plot.I really enjoy
these.I think fans of the show will
still continue to enjoy these graphic novels.And I can’t wait to see what’s in store for Toph.We should definitely get some character
development in this series for her. Can’t
wait.

Friday, March 7, 2014

Firefly Lane
was not quite what I expected.I had
read a few reviews a while back about this book being about a friendship, but
for some reason, I didn’t know it spanned a 30 year time period.Nevertheless the book was pretty good.

I liked the
concept of this book.Girls will make lifelong
friends, and there are ups and downs throughout all friendships. Heck, I have
had a friend since 7th grade, but we’ve become estranged for the
past 4 years. But we’re now getting back in touch. Our lives went different
directions, and as we get older, it’s hard to keep in touch when you don’t have
as many things in common any more.But
if it’s a real friendship, you’ll usually find your way back at some point.

This book
was about two girls who met when they were 14.They became friends after one of the girls has a heartbreaking
experience.I liked the part the best
when they were younger.They hadn’t
quite gotten annoying yet.The
background information on Tully was very interesting and it left me being very
curious where she would end up.

Kate was
more similar to me (of course I’m about the age of their kids…) but her
personality was more like mine so I could relate to her more.But eventually she started to get annoying to
me as well because she never stood up for herself.She would always let Tully talk her in to
doing things she didn’t want to do, and she let Tully run her life for years.

Their high
school years were the most entertaining though.Once they got to college it started to drag for me a bit.I feel like this story was dragged out a bit
much.It was on 15 discs for crying out
loud!That was roughly 15 hours of
audio!And I didn’t feel like their voices changed
from middle school, to high school, to college.They seemed to be changing schools, but not actually growing up.

The story
picked up for me once Kate was married. But again, all her insecurities started
to really frustrate me.She was so
insecure in herself and seemed to have such low self-esteem. I think that’s why
she couldn’t stand up for herself with Tully either.But the story itself started to get really
good again.

Once they
graduated college the girls really start drifting and their priorities
changing.I liked watching it because it
was very similar to real life.But it
also meant it got boring.I don’t
usually read books for reality.I read
them to get AWAY from reality.

But the book
got good again once kids started showing up.I’m now at this point in my life so I was able to relate to it as well,
which might be why it started to get interesting to me again. I can really
related to Kate’s miscarriage.It made
me sob.It brought back so many memories
– I wish I knew that so I wasn’t listening to it in the car, while driving on
the freeway!But it gives me hope that
Kate went on to have healthy kids.But
Kate’s exhaustion seemed a little over the top.I know having kids will be tiring.But she was a stay at home mom (which I’m not by any means saying is
easy – I know that it is difficult being with your kids all day), but it also
means she had more time to get house work done, etc which working parents don’t
have.I know a lot of moms – especially new
moms – who are not nearly as exhausted as Kate was.

Once Kate
was a mom I felt she seemed to grow up though.Tully got successful and seemed to mostly grow up. I got bored once it
focused on how much Kate and her daughter fought and I hated it when Tully got
in the middle of it.I just wanted to
slap her for Kate.

I tried to
guess what the big betrayal was going to be, but I was way off.I didn’t really expect that at all – and frankly,
I don’t think I would have ever gotten back in touch with her if she had done
that to me.It was awful.

So the best
part of the story is what happens when your lifelong friendship falls
apart?What do you do?How do you mend the pieces together? Do you
suck it up and be the bigger person?When something awful happens in your life, who do you want to talk to
and be there with you?

The final
part of the story is really very sad.It
definitely had me tearing up.I think it
focused on this a little too much, but it really got across the point.And it also teaches the readers some
important lessons.

Overall I
think the concept was really good and mostly achieved.The characters could have been a little more
lovable though.And the story probably
could have been about 5 chapters shorter.Some neat things were tied back together at the end which was both sad
and neat.I think if you have a really
good friend, you should read this book.But beware that there are some slow parts.Just look for the overall arcs and be
prepared to cry!

Wednesday, March 5, 2014

Just announced yesterday, Colleen Houck stated that her
secret project she has been working on is a prequel to the Tiger’s Curse saga!

Tiger’s Promise (Tiger Saga 0.5) will focus on the story of
Ren and Kishan before Kelsey, specifically their love for Yesubai.From the description of the story, it sounds like
it will be from Yesubai’s POV mostly.

While we know how this story ends, it will be very
interesting to get to know this character.I’m excited to see how it all goes down, since we’ve only heard it from
Ren and Kishan’s POVs.So what really
happened, and what is Lokesh like as a father – since he’s super creepy when he
wants to have a kid with Kelsey - totally grossed out by that BTW.I’m interested to see how she deals with
being stuck between Lokesh and her love.

Though I’m still anxiously awaiting Tiger’s Dream, I know
that it is not coming any time soon.See
my previous post.But this
is something exciting to look forward to in the world we’ve come to love so
much.

The book is set to release on June 1, 2014.Keep your eyes out for the cover reveal as
well – which with the book releasing in 3 months, should happen relatively
soon!Who else is as excited as I am
about this secret project?

My husband has always been frustrated with the fact that I do
not really like soups or stews.There
are only a few exceptions, but on the whole, I don’t like them. Well, I think
we discovered the cause:

My husband and I were talking to my parents last night about
raising kids in general.We were
speculating whether our kids are going to be chill, rule followers like me, or
more rambunctious like him.The
conversation led to what parents have to sacrifice to discipline their children
(this may have started due to a crying baby that the parents let just cry the
entire time we were in the restaurant – side note: People, if you have a crying
baby, PLEASE take the baby outside until it calms down.Some of us are trying to enjoy our meal out –
and may have paid for a babysitter to have a quiet night.Be respectful of others).

That being said, our conversation went to how my parents
used to have to tag team eating dinner if either my brother or I were getting
out of control.My dad said that if we
were being obnoxious in the car, he would turn the car around and then we’d
have to eat dinner at home instead.To
this, my mom stated that because she loved soup and we didn’t, if we ended up
coming back home, she would make soup for dinner and that was what we were
stuck with.

It all became very clear why I do not like soup then!It was punishment!My husband always makes fun of me for my
strong associations.So I completely
believe that in my young, impressionable mind, soup was a punishment and my subconscious
decided that for the rest of my life I will not enjoy soup.

Of course my parents felt bad when we pointed it out.But it’s what we do as parents, right?In order to make your kids be behaving,
contributors to society, some things end up as side effects.So what is the harm in me not liking soup,
when I’ve been raised well?I’ve never
done drugs or smoked.I never got
drunk.I’ve never been arrested.I work hard.I married a wonderful man.I
consider myself raised really well, and hope to raise our kids to be the
same.

As parents, we just have to decide if we’re willing to make
sacrifices to make our kids better.And
we have to accept we will “scar them for life” (as I told my parents about not
getting an Easter basket one year), but that it is worth it in the end to raise
good kids.